


Love is watching someone die

by Itisariddle



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Dare to Write Challenge, Death, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-24
Updated: 2016-08-24
Packaged: 2018-08-10 19:55:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,202
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7858996
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Itisariddle/pseuds/Itisariddle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is the first thing I wrote after Alan Rickman passed away. This is my way of dealing.</p><p>Disclaimer: I own nothing JKR does I make no money off of this fanfiction nor do I plan to</p>
            </blockquote>





	Love is watching someone die

**Author's Note:**

> This is the first thing I wrote after Alan Rickman passed away. I couldn't work, write, do anything since his passing. Until I wrote this, it is not supposed to be good. It is not supposed to be anything. I am hoping it will be my way of getting back to myself though. Enjoy.

Love is watching someone die

1\. 

‘Is she here again?’ The blue haired healer whispers to the tiny blonde one in a tone that suggest she does not care who hears her.  
‘Every. Day.’ The other answers, her voice is more demure, she wants to talk but cannot and there is not blame in that. Gossip is a natural state for the human condition and it always wins.

Hermione Granger ignores it all. 

Yes, she is here again. Yes, the spell preventing her access to the room is still activated; she tried it when she got here. The threshold repelled her as it did every day of the past month and she is kidding herself trying to think that this time the spell was weaker. 

But he can’t prevent her standing here and watching. He can’t close the curtains on the enormous window, can’t make the healers leave. He can’t do anything lying there and Hermione thinks that it must be awful. That it must be the thing killing him, more than the snakebite is.  
She hugs herself placing her arms around herself until it gets painful and she stares and stares. 

There were days, in the beginning, when he glared back at her. Days where his eyes moved and he tried to indicate to her with everything he had that she was not welcome.  
She got the hint. She always did, somehow, too late, but she always knew the right answer to his questions. 

Now though it did not matter. 

The spell preventing her access to the room is there but he no longer seems to care where she is. She can see his chest rise and fall but his eyes only open occasionally now and what he sees goes beyond her. She doubts. Maybe coming here is not about him anymore. 

Maybe it is about her. 

2.

There is a job offer and she does not come in for a couple of days as she makes up her mind. 

There is a new light in the hallway when she finally manages to come back, three days into a fight with Ron and no way closer to deciding. The air is thick and smells of concealed decay. It has been raining for days and she is confused. There were not supposed to be any fights, she was not supposed to feel this empty.  
The blue haired healer is standing in the hallway with a concerned expression on her face and at first Hermione ignores her, but then the implication of what it means that she is standing there hits her and she runs, jeans sticking to her legs from the rain and her hair plastered to her cheek and she only stops when she is half way across the room and he is right in front of her.

Her mind registers everything at once. He is awake and looking at her his eyebrows raised in what seems like genuine surprise and he is breathing and she is standing in the room that she has thus far only seen from outside. 

Not that there is much to see. 

The adrenaline from the surprise of seeing her fades and she watches as he struggles to keep his eyes open. The blue haired healer walks in passed her, pulls a wand and mutters a spell and she watches him loose the battle to stay awake. It is an awkward loss, one that does not come easy, and she does not know how long she is watching it but when she comes to her senses, the blue haired healer is gone and she is alone with only the buzzing spell that is supposed to add something to his blood, for company.  
Hermione sits down on the edge of the bed awkwardly, she does not dare wake him and watches the walls blur into a white and purple mess as tears fill her eyes. 

3\. 

She comes in every day and he is asleep most days so she sits there and watches the walls and counts the number of times his chest rises and the number of times it falls. 

4\. 

She comes in and he is not asleep for once. He is even sitting up and reading the newspaper. 

She has time to brace herself against the doorframe breath in and walk into the room calmly. She pulls the paper in his hands down a bit only in time to find him looking at her expectantly, diminishing all of her hopes that he had not in fact, hear her walk in. He looks ghastly but alert, the buzzing of another constant spell blurs into the background and is carried away on the heels of the blue haired healer who walks into the room and out again without being noticed. 

She smiles at him and sits down at the edge of the bed. He is thinner than ever before, his sallow skin seems to be hanging off bones and there is no one to cut or even comb his hair but he looks at her and his eyes are clear. The wound around his neck is a mess of flesh and wires and she does not even want to know what kind of magic is involved there. 

She is staring so intently that he has to nudge her a couple of times before she realizes that he is offering her the paper. She blinks and takes it from him. There is an unflattering picture of her entering the hospital and an article suggesting various theories as to why Ron Weasly’s fiancé is there. 

What is she doing in this hole? This snake pit? With the Death Eater.

She looks up from the paper to find him staring at her for a change, his eyebrow raised and half his mouth curled up into a smirk. It takes her a while to realize that he is teasing. She grimaces and mimics the raised eyebrow and then sticks her tongue out at him. 

His face transforms into a look of genuine surprise before he smiles. 

And she can’t breathe.'

5.

She gets in early the next day holding a brand new paper in her hand proclaiming even more rubbish. She had another fight with Ron but that does not matter for now because she is anticipating the look on his face when he reads this. 

The blue haired healer is standing in the hallway again and when she tries to pass her the pudgy old witch steps in her way.  
There are things to discuss apparently but Hermione pushes past her to the room but the door is closed and the curtain is too and she does not understand. 

The blue haired witch walks past her. She opens the door for her but Hermione cannot step trough. She doesn’t understand and when she does it hurts but she grits her teeth and steps back and watches the curtains open. 

His eyes are closed. There is no movement and the blue haired healer only adjusts the blankets. 

Hermione stands there watching, watching. 

Arms twitch.

Breath stops.

But after that there is so much the body does before it becomes just a body. 

And she stands there and watches and watches.


End file.
